The thing she can teach you

The activity

Ask her to teach you something she can do and you can’t. She runs the lesson, you get it wrong in front of her, and at the end you tell her what you learned.

What it is for. Much of a child’s day is spent being taught and corrected. Teaching you something turns that round: she’s the one who knows, you’re the one getting it wrong, and she sees you take her seriously. For a child who finds school hard, it’s a chance to be good at something in front of someone whose opinion matters to her.

• The first step. Notice something she can do that you can’t, and ask for a lesson: “Will you teach me how you do that? I’ve no idea where to start.” It can be anything she cares about, from a game to a dance to a way of drawing eyes.

When to get help. If she often says she’s useless or no good at anything, compares herself harshly with other children, or is pulling away from friends and things she used to enjoy, and it has lasted several weeks or is getting worse, talk to her school and your GP. The school may be able to link her with a mentor, or help her take on a new responsibility. If she tells you that someone is hurting her, that she is hurting herself, or that she does not want to be alive, stay calm, thank her for telling you, do not promise to keep it secret, and act that day, using the routes under “If you need help right now”, at the foot of every page.

The other five steps, and your part in it, are in the library.

It goes with

• Perfectionism. For parents whose child can’t bear to get anything wrong.
• Neurodiversity, and the Conversation with the School. For parents whose child has been working harder and longer than other children to do things that come more easily to them.

The first chapter you open here is free to read in full.

Free on this subject

• Self-esteem. What to do first, what helps, and who else can help. Free to read and to print.
• Perfectionism. What to do first, what helps, and who else can help. Free to read and to print.